This invention relates to monolithic room enclosing modules and particularly to an inexpensive method for making such modules.
In recent years, prefabricated room-enclosing boxes or modules have found wide acceptance an an alternative construction technique. Such modules are generally formed by pouring concrete into a mold at a factory. The completed module is then transported to the construction site where it may be used alone as a single-room building or in conjunction with identical modules to form multiroom buildings, including high-rise buildings.
In many areas of the world the concrete which is used in both conventional and prefabricated building techniques is expensive. To reduce the amount of concrete required in conventional techniques, and to thus reduce the cost of the building, filler blocks such as hollow clay tiles are often used.
In conventional reinforced concrete structures which do not use prefabricated modules, a skeleton of vertical structural posts, horizontal beams and floors is formed by pouring concrete into molds at the construction site. Often, in-fill cinder blocks or hollow clay tile are stacked between the structural posts and held together with mortar to form the building walls. These walls may then be coated with stucco or other finishing material. Of course, such a building technique does not provide the many advantages of prefabricated, factory-constructed module techniques. Further, placing the in-fill blocks in the structure can be very time consuming and costly. As an alternative, in-fill masonry blocks are not set in mortar, and are held in place only by the stucco skin. But this technique is less likely to provide the structural stability required to withstand high lateral forces.
An object of this invention is to provide a room-enclosing module which uses no more concrete, or less concrete, than is necessary with conventional building techniques but which still retains the advantages of low-labor concrete molding of room-sized molds. Further, an object of this invention is to provide a method for molding a module in which the walls of the module are held together by more than just a stucco skin in order that the walls will withstand exceptionally high lateral forces, but which does not require that filler blocks be individually mortared together.